Thursday, January 28, 2010

“Three New Dance Biographies - BackStage.com” plus 3 more

“Three New Dance Biographies - BackStage.com” plus 3 more

Three New Dance Biographies - BackStage.com

Posted: 27 Jan 2010 01:59 PM PST

Coinciding with Lincoln Center's 50th anniversary this theatrical season, three new biographies of dance artists who made significant contributions, largely behind the scenes, to dance at Lincoln Center have been published. A magnificent biography of Martha Hill illuminates the dedicated dance educator's integral role in sustaining the threatened Dance Division at the Juilliard School when the illustrious conservatory took up residence at Lincoln Center. An examination of the life and work of Alfredo Corvino shows what a master ballet teacher he was, both as a longtime member of the Juilliard faculty and at the Metropolitan Opera Ballet School. While American Ballet Theatre is not headquartered at Lincoln Center, its annual spring seasons there, at the Metropolitan Opera House, have become one of the venue's signature offerings. A new book about ABT's famous patron Lucia Chase reveals what an important role this wealthy woman played in the establishment and development of the distinguished ballet company.


'Martha Hill and the Making of American Dance'

Though not a household name, even among members of the dance community, Hill was one of the most influential figures in the creation of the art form of modern dance, spearheading the historic Bennington College summer dance programs, the American Dance Festival, and the dance department at the Juilliard School. In "Martha Hill and the Making of American Dance" (Wesleyan University Press, 2009, 422 pages, $35), author Janet Mansfield Soares situates Hill's notable professional accomplishments within the heated context of the early days of American modern dance. While painting a provocative personal portrait of Hill, Soares makes the mid–20th century come alive with such titillating vivacity that one feels cheated not to have lived through it and envious of those who were there at the burgeoning of the brand-new art form.

One of the finest dance biographies I have ever read, Soares' work represents the perfect blend of colorful and pertinent factual details and larger contextualizing ideas. I was amazed at how quickly I whizzed through the lengthy volume and how much I learned about a topic with which I was already very familiar. If you know little about Hill and modern dance, this book will introduce you to fascinating information. If you know quite a bit about the subject, it will captivate you even more.


'Equipoise: The Life and Work of Alfredo Corvino'

It is impossible to calculate the enormous influence of and vast number of dancers who have been nurtured by Corvino, a beloved ballet teacher for many years in New York—at Juilliard, the Met Opera Ballet, and his own Dance Circle studio—and for the last 10 years of his life the ballet master for Pina Bausch's Tanztheater Wuppertal in Germany. He deserves a better biography. Written by Dawn Lille, "Equipoise: The Life and Work of Alfredo Corvino" (Dance Movement Press, 2009, 192 pages, $24.95) is a dull, choppy book that provides little insight into Corvino the man and reads like a dance-history textbook, with the events of his life used simply as excuses for the presentation of dry historical facts. Lille's exhaustive paragraphs of factoids are clumsily inserted into the narrative and impelled by simplistic contextual ideas that have very little to do with Corvino's story. Though one appreciates her attempts to provide cultural context, rather than lending momentum to her writing or offering compelling ideas to keep the reader engaged, they repeatedly pull the text off track and make for plodding, unsatisfying reading.

The really valuable parts of Lille's book are the two chapters near the end that describe Corvino's teaching, though they're sadly underdeveloped. The descriptions of his exercises, exactly how he taught them, and the principles guiding the proper execution of them are what will interest the serious dance reader. One wishes the book contained more of this kind of information, buttressed with quotes from former students perhaps, and fewer of those encyclopedic facts obtainable in any good dance reference work.


'Bravura!: Lucia Chase and the American Ballet Theatre'

I am always suspicious of biographies written by a close relative of the subject, so it was with caution that I approached "Bravura!: Lucia Chase and the American Ballet Theatre" (University Press of Florida, 2009, 368 pages, $36), an enjoyable book about ABT's founding patron and artistic director (from 1945 to 1980) written by her son Alex C. Ewing. While its lack of a bibliography, footnotes, or list of reference sources forces one to question its complete accuracy and the author's objectivity, "Bravura!" is an undeniably good yarn.

Written with a kind and caring tone toward all its characters and their endeavors on behalf of American ballet, the book offers great emotional insight without getting overly caught up in psychological analysis. The reader gets a real sense of what it felt like to work with Antony Tudor, for example, or to be involved with the haphazard, shockingly amateurish proceedings that characterized the formation of American Ballet Theatre (originally called Ballet Theatre). With ideal fluidity, Ewing weaves his mother's personal and professional stories into a thoughtful narrative devoid of any sense of compromised perspective. He has a real talent for personality description and portrays all the famous people in the book—even the less admirable ones—as multidimensional, sympathetic figures.

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Author Louis Auchincloss chronicled America's patricians - Everett Herald

Posted: 28 Jan 2010 05:51 AM PST

NEW YORK — Louis Auchincloss, a prolific author of fiction and nonfiction whose dozens of books imparted sober, firsthand knowledge of America's patrician class, has died. He was 92,

The author's grandson said Wednesday that Auchincloss died Tuesday, after suffering a stroke.

He wrote more than 50 books and crafted such accomplished works as the novel "The Rector of Justin" and the memoir "A Writer's Capital," not to mention biographies, literary criticism and short stories. He was a four-time fiction finalist for the National Book Award, his nominated novels including "The Embezzler" and "The House of Five Talents."

"I'm rather inclined to be edgy when I'm not writing," Auchincloss said in 1994. "In (a) ... book on Jack Kennedy, it says he told (British) Prime Minister (Harold) Macmillan that if he didn't have a girl every three days he'd get headaches. I thought that was rather extreme, but writing is little bit like that for me."

For subject matter, Auchincloss followed the advice of Henry James: "Do New York. The firsthand account is precious." Auchincloss documented an exclusive, influential world of which he was both member and critic. Readers were taken into boardrooms, country clubs, summer homes at Bar Harbor, dinner parties on Fifth Avenue.

On Wednesday, Gore Vidal praised Auchincloss as a friend whose literary subject was unique. "Nobody else took those kinds of people, because nobody else understood them, except in the dumbest way," Vidal said.

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University of Virginia - Chicago Tribune

Posted: 28 Jan 2010 06:48 AM PST

— Louis Auchincloss, a prolific author of fiction and nonfiction whose dozens of books imparted sober, firsthand knowledge of America's patrician class, has died. He was 92.

The author's grandson, James Auchincloss, said Wednesday that Auchincloss died Tuesday, a week after suffering a stroke.

Louis Auchincloss' wife, Adele, an artist and environmentalist, died in 1991. They had three sons.

He wrote more than 50 books, averaging about one a year after the end of World War II, and crafted such accomplished works as the novel "The Rector of Justin" and the memoir "A Writer's Capital," not to mention biographies, literary criticism and short stories. He was a four-time fiction finalist for the National Book Award, his nominated novels including "The Embezzler" and "The House of Five Talents."

Auchincloss lived up to the old world ideal of being "useful," bearing the various titles of writer, attorney, community leader and family man.

He was a partner at the Wall Street firm of Hawkins, Delafield & Wood and the father of three. He served as president of the Museum of the City of New York and the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

He was also a cousin by marriage to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and she worked with him when she was a book editor late in her life.

Auchincloss did not seek to praise the rich, but to make sense of them. He was a Puritan who brooded over the conflicts between money and principles, over the privileged person's right to be happy.

He was born in New York in 1917, his ancestors having arrived from Scotland more than a century before. Auchincloss' grandmother knew Edith Wharton, and his father was a Wall Street lawyer.

His early years were typical of his class: a Fifth Avenue private school, Groton, Yale University, law school at the University of Virginia.

After serving in the Navy during World War II, he completed his first novel, "The Indifferent Children," a war story the insecure young writer published under the pen name "Andrew Lee."

Reviewers, however, praised the book, and from that point, the author remained forever Auchincloss. He quit law in 1951, discovered the additional time did nothing for his writing and returned in 1954.

He was so compulsive a writer that after completing a short biography of Theodore Roosevelt for Times Books' presidential series, he showed up unannounced at the offices of his publisher with a finished text for Calvin Coolidge, only to be told that president's life had been assigned to someone else.

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Chamling's awards genuine: Govt - Hindustan Times

Posted: 28 Jan 2010 06:05 AM PST

With Chief Minister Pawan Kumar Chamling facing Opposition flak for allegedly purchasing awards using public money, the state government said on Thursday that the two latest awards to him were genuine and given in recognition of his contributions.

The American Biographical Institute (ABI) has decided to invite Chamling to join the organisation as an outstanding individual as per the communication received from its president J M Evans, the Information and Public Relations Department (IPR) said in a release here today.

ABI had done due diligence of over 4,000 people of professional importance, including Chamling, to determine the names of those to be inducted to its Hall of Fame, the release said. The ABI in its 42 years' publication has published over 250 biographies of those it has honoured in it dwelt on their leadership skills and excellence in public life, it said. Similarly, the New Delhi-based Friendship Forum of India has chosen to give 'Best Personality Award' and a gold medal to Chamling in recognition of his outstanding performance and exceptional leadership, the release added. BJP and other opposition parties have been questioning the propriety of various awards being given to Chamling by various organisations since he assumed office in 1994 and alleged that the chief minister had paid from the public exchequer for purchasing the awards.

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